New West
But when Ada County Commissioner and gubernatorial candidate Sharon Ullman asked him whether he'd looked at the Boise streetcar proposal specifically, O'Toole admitted he wasn't particularly familiar with it.
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Many transportation and other infrastructure improvements are financed by taxes on property. That tax is assessed at one rate on the combined value of the land itself and the buildings.

A working paper by Jason Junge and David Levinson explores the question of what would happen if the tax rates were split and land were taxed at a higher rate while the tax on improvements was lowered.

"A parcel of land has a value based on surrounding improvements the community has made, and raising the tax on land allows the community to keep a greater portion of the value generated by public projects. Buildings have value based on the effort and expense the owners have incurred to construct them, and a corresponding decrease in the tax on improvements allows property owners to keep more of the value they have created for themselves," the authors argue.

Several benefits for the local government would accrue from the split taxes.

University of Minnesota
"Likewise, physical inactivity is linked to an array of negative health effects including heart disease and diabetes. Neighborhood design can influence air pollution and walkability; more walkable neighborhoods may encourage higher daily activity levels."
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"Affordability is not just the cost of a house," said Shelley Poticha, Reconnecting America's former CEO who is now preaching the gospel of sustainable communities from inside the Obama administration.

Poticha, the senior advisor for sustainable housing and communities at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, was in San Francisco last week for the Urban Land Institute's gathering and the unveiling of a new report on housing and transportation costs, the Bay Area Burden.

The report is discussed in this blog post. But unmentioned was Poticha's suggestion that perhaps it's time to put stickers on houses showing a cost of homeownership that incorporates transportation expenses. Such a sticker would allow buyers to comparison shop and reward developers who build near transit.

Contra Costa Times
"The market cannot by itself supply - under our current zoning regulations, under our current infrastructure, without help from the government - it cannot supply adequate affordable housing close to people's jobs,"
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San Francisco Bay Area residents spend an average of 59 percent of their income on combined housing and transportation costs, with parts of the nine-county Northern California region averaging in excess of 70 percent, a new report from the Urban Land Institute's Terwilliger Center for Workforce Housing reports.

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The Half-Mile Circles blog is a place to share information about recent research, innovations and other issues related to TOD and livable communities. We also invite experts to talk about their work. Combined with Jeff Wood's The Other Side of the Tracks, the Half-Mile Circles blog is an opportunity for a daily dose of TOD, and allows you to weigh in with your own opinions. Usual blog rules apply; please keep the comment threads civil. To submit an expert article, contact Jeff Wood